


Shades of Cool

by Piarelei



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: (how will they know?), (they're gonna know), Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Billy's Mop, Canon-Typical Violence, Colorblind-until-meeting soulmates, Drinking a can of soda, Homophobic Language, I swear no one is gonna know, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Domestic Violence, M/M, Max likes ice-cream, Mild Language, Steve's Beemer, Stop asking me to tag useless things, Stop reading if it doesn't suit you, TW:, The sun - Freeform, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-27
Updated: 2020-08-03
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:02:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 13,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25547902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Piarelei/pseuds/Piarelei
Summary: Billy wishes for one thing and one thing only: to turn eighteen and hightail it out of Hawkins, fucking Indiana. His soulmate waits for him by the sea, where he's from, feet in foamy waves and hair to the wind. Not between two pine trees, nose as cold as an icicle.When he meets Steve Harrington, his entire world tilts on its axis.
Relationships: Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington
Comments: 64
Kudos: 252





	1. Blue

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be a short little prompt, all fun and giggles. But it grew and grew and grew to become a good chunk of Harringrove. I had fun writing it. I hope you enjoy reading it! c: 
> 
> Thank you to [shewritesdirty](shewritesdirty.tumblr.com) and [hmg621](hmg621.tumblr.com) for being fantastic beta-readers and helping me out a great deal.

Cali was fucking beautiful. Great slats of burning white blinding him as the sun ricocheted off the ocean. Billy used to look upon the waves and know that this peculiar shade of gray was called blue. Remembered how his mother pressed the word, her smile, against his ear to tell him. Knew by the tilt of her voice alone that it was her favorite color.

Knew that it was a secret between them. That his mom wasn’t supposed to see colors. That his dad lives in shades of monochrome. That maybe he hoped to beat the colors out of her.

Billy doesn’t know what happened to his mom; one morning, she simply wasn’t there anymore, her hair bright in the white sun. Doesn’t know if she joined a world of colors or if Neil pushed her back in the dark.

His dad never talks about it, treats him to the back of his hand every time he asks. Billy has stopped asking a long time ago. He still gets a slap for his efforts. So, he bows his head and takes it; what else is there to do, now that his mom isn’t here to shield him from the worst of it? When his father remarries, he doesn’t think that anything is going to change. 

He is right. His mother was one of a kind. 

Susan came into their life, meek and quiet, muted by a life of gray, dressed in all white from dawn till dusk. She had told him “because you can never go wrong with white, Billy” when he had asked, at the beginning, when he still talked to her. But he had caught something else in her voice, the shrill of uncertainty maybe, as she wasn’t sure she would agree with this situation for long. Almost as if she expected to get a ring at her finger, readied herself to drop Neil and the wallowing life of self-pity they shared as soon as she met her other half and discovered red, white and royal blue.

Sometimes, back in Cali, he saw her watching through the living room window, the tilt of her head wistful. She and Neil go through the monochrome like robots; they’ve stopped trying so long ago. But in those moments, those interludes where he could draw the curtains and see the young woman that she used to be, hopeful and radiant with the possibility of love, he can almost see her as human. Almost feel like she hasn’t quite given up yet. And it makes something uncomfortable clench in Billy’s stomach, the need to find colors, to see the blue of the ocean, quick, fast, away from here.

Indiana, in comparison to Cali, is dark and cold, makes his shades of gray seem ten times more bleak.

His step-sister is an annoying constant in his passenger seat, hair too long and tangled by the open windows. They don’t talk, stare at the road, the trees, the dark, above, around and under. Billy can’t see shit; he pushes on the pedals all the same, feels the slap of the breeze on his cheekbone and the smell of rotten leaves high in his nose.

Maxine slides further in her seat, Billy sees her hands clench around the leather, he feels her fear like a tangible presence in the car; he doesn’t care. The quicker he gets in this shithole, the quicker he can get back out.

He doesn’t look at Maxine when she gets out of his car and bags it in the general direction of the high school, without a word; rude but he doesn’t need to be seen with that troll anyway. 

The parking lot is crowded and he feels the sharp gazes of dozens of girls at his back. Cows, the bunch of them. He certainly won’t find his soulmate here; not when his soulmate is back in Cali, sun-kissed and eager to show him the cerulean ocean.

Billy throws his cigarette to the ground, doesn’t bother to stamp down on it. He doesn’t mind setting the world on fire, burning them all, turn them into charred silhouettes and blow them away with a breath. He probably wouldn’t get arrested; who the hell cares about Hawkins, bumfuck Indiana?

The air smells different up here; clean and sappy, and he misses the rotten smell of exhaust and piss like a phantom limb, tries to count the day until his 18th birthday when he can take his car and go. Meet his soulmate. See the colors. It’s a whole plan. 

He hasn’t even started unpacking yet. Hopes he doesn’t have to. Hopes Neil fucks shit up at his new job, can’t keep his hands off the secretary like last time. 

Billy sneers. Hawkins High cheers. Losers. 

People talk to him all day long, burly dudes in need of a shower swing an arm across his shoulders and he pushes them into a row of lockers. Pissy girls breathe bubble-gum all over his face and he jeers and snaps his teeth; they laugh and disperse like a flock of geese. They think it’s a game; but Billy feels like he could hurt them if he wanted; he never did it before, but he could bite one, just to make an example. But then, he wouldn’t be able to fuck them, so where’s the fun in that. 

Billy is getting kind of tired of all the attention, thinks of skipping the afternoon to find a place to smoke around town. Then there is this guy, ugly and short, who steps beside him and follows him between periods, waves a ridiculous paper in front of him.

“Halloween party, man. Loads of booze and pussy.”

Billy takes it and bobs his head; maybe he’ll go. Maybe he’ll drink _lots of booze and manage some pussy_.

* * *

  
  


Billy realizes that high school party beer is universally bad as he drops from the keg to an eruption of cheers. He throws his arms up and lets the euphoria of alcohol push his victory scream out of his mouth. There are people pressing on his sides as beer drips from his chin and a darkened mouth smacks him across the cheek; he can feel the smear of lipstick stick to his skin.

He doesn't bother looking at her in the eyes; he doesn't expect his soulmate to be here; he expects to meet her gaze through the crowd, foam at her feet and light in her hair. California sands rolling between his toes. Skin reddened by the sun. 

So it comes as a bit of a surprise when everything lights up in shades of red and tones of blue.

Small-and-ugly is at his shoulder and pushes him forward, and there is-

"We got ourselves a new keg king, Harrington!"

Billy's mind blanks out; he sees the exact same reaction behind Harrington's eyes.

It cannot be happening. His breath is stale with bad beer and he thinks for a wild, unbelievable moment, that he has alcohol poisoning, that he’s in a coma in a sub-par hospital in this state and that he is having a nightmare. 

Billy looks at him, the other, his _soulmate_ ; it makes his mouth curl with distaste. There is the churning flow of a thunderstorm in his throat. He feels like throwing up.

His soulmate is a man. An honest-to-god, penis-bearing, beard-growing man and he can't believe fate has betrayed him like that. Billy wants to get away from it, go back in time, never come back. Live in black and white his whole life if it means not facing this kind of cruel joke. 

Harrington opens his mouth to talk and Billy punches him in the face. He sees him topple to the floor in a heap, sees his grimace and his blood-stained teeth. Panic clenches his teeth shut. 

He cannot talk. He cannot look at him. There is a roar in his ears, it floods his mind, makes him feel like a rag doll without a will. 

Everything is a mistake. He cannot let Harrington talk and get the better of him. No one can know that he’s got a queer male soulmate. 

“Shut the fuck up,” he roars to the floor, as his feet carry him further and further away. 

_Ugly_ laughs at his shoulders and presses close, so fucking close to holler in his face. Billy pushes him away, doesn't look back to see if he cracked his head falling. There is a girl standing by the backdoor, smeared with makeup and watching him with light gray eyes; Billy circles her waist with an arm and tugs her into the night outside, black and comforting.  _ Expected _ .

He doesn't think about color.

  
  


* * *

  
  
  


Steve Harrington has a split lip and thunderous eyes when he turns up to school the next morning. Mr Johnson tells him to stop standing by the door like an idiot and to sit down so he can begin droning on about the Catcher in the Rye.

Harrington is two places up from Billy; he can feel him like a burn at the back of his neck. He tries to look aloof and uncaring, like he should be, but there is sweat gathering in his palms and a buzz in his ears. He doesn't know the names, but he knows that M. Johnson's shirt clashes weirdly with his pants and Billy doesn't know how he should be dealing with this.

He hopes to gods that Harrington didn't run his stupid mouth.

* * *

  
  


He gets out of the locker room particularly late and there's Gray-Eyes pumping gum at him, twirling hair around her finger like a meaty curling iron.

"Hey Bills," she says in a strawberry-flavored breath.

He grunts and adjusts his sport bag on his shoulder, walks past her without another word. He listens to the sounds of her heels following him, hazards on gravel and grass, the hitch of her voice calling after him and Billy doesn't slow down, simply walks to his car.

When he turns back, she has given up and is glaring up a storm at him, throwing hair over her shoulder with an attempt at confidence. He leans against his car, looks at her stomping away, and waits for Maxine.

Steve Harrington finds him instead. Billy doesn't know how he sneaked up on him, but he's suddenly feet away, and something akin to panic roars in his stomach.

Billy does his best not to startle; locks his jaw, clenches his fists. 

"We gotta talk," Harrington says.

"No we don't," he answers like a kid.

Harrington looks like he has bitten in a lemon; he grimaces. 

"Listen man, I don't want this anymore than you, but we gotta talk about it. Someone is bound to notice that we see shit at some point."

Billy juts his jaw and stubbornly doesn't say anything.

"Listen, you either talk to me, or I will go around telling people about shit."

A flare of anger pierces his sternum. Billy straightens up, tries to loom over Harrington even if the fucker has a good inch on him.

"You ain't gonna tell shit." He bares his teeth. "Or I'm gonna put you six feet under, dickhead."

Harrington winces, takes a step back. Billy tries to feel more satisfied with that than he actually does. 

"Jesus fuck, you don't need to do that. I just wanna talk, fuck. Why are you so difficult." It's not a question.

They stare at each other for a while. Steve's eyes are kinda dark. Billy doesn't know the color for it and he swallows around the disappointment.

"I'm not a faggot," says Billy at one point.

Harrington grimaces.

"Yeah. I'm not either, kinda got a girlfriend and all that."

"We don't gotta talk then."

Harrington sighs exasperatedly. Billy wants to bare his teeth at him. He's about to push him around to get him to scram when Maxine comes around the car, looking at him all weird.

Harrington looks at her for a second before shaking his head and taking a step back.

"Listen, the quarry tonight, at ten. We gotta talk, man."

Billy shrugs, he's not going there. Harrington leaves all the same. He turns to Maxine.

"You're late, you're skating home."

Maxine gets red in two seconds flat and begins to puff up. Billy ignores her and gets in his car, pulls out of the parking lot so fast, he doesn't realize he has named colors for the first time.

Hawkins High is far behind when he pulls over because he cannot breathe anymore.

* * *

  
  


It's half past nine when he stops his car, headlight rippling over water. Harrington isn't here yet. 

Billy chews on his bottom lip and takes a cigarette out of his pack, doesn't light it. 

He didn't really mean to come here. Soulmates don't really mean shit to him; colors do, he likes this stuff, it sounds really gay, but makes the world a lot prettier. Whatever, there is no one in his head but him. 

He doesn't know if it makes him sentimental, or the protagonist of a bad movie, but life does look better since he stumbled upon Harrington.

If he actually were in a romantic comedy, he would have bumped into a cute girl on the first day of school and they would have made out against the lockers, right here and then, and talked about how kissing his soulmate felt electric and shit, like they always did in movies. 

Billy would prefer to avoid kissing Harrington; he isn't going to be anyone's bitch, even if kissing one's soulmate is like tasting heaven or some kind of similar bullshit. He's alright with staying on Earth. 

Headlights move across the road and Harrington is here, looking surprised and a bit pale, going out of a fancy BMW. 

"Didn't think you would actually show up," he says when Billy follows him and leans against his car. 

Billy lights his cigarette, exhales a plume of smoke in Harrington’s direction for an answer. He looks awkward, hands jammed in his pocket and toeing at a rock with his sneakers, watching him from below his lashes. Billy wishes he would talk already. 

"Didn't you wanna talk or something?"

Harrington has a very put-upon sigh and rubs his forehead with the palm of his hand. 

"Yeah sure, I did."

He keeps quiet for too long for it to be a pause. Billy feels anger prickling at the back of his eyes. His fingers twitch around his smoke. 

"What then?" He bites, after yet another minute of silence. It feels weird to look at Harrington squirm this long. 

"Jesus. Alright.” He takes a breath. “So… I'm your soulmate."

Billy feels his throat closing up. Panic spikes in his stomach, clenches painfully in his gut. 

"The fuck you are, I'm not a fag." 

Harrington looks at him, thunder in his eyes, fists at his sides. 

"Listen, dickbag, I'm not enjoying it either, but you gotta admit what happened."

Billy scoffs, throws the butt of his cigarette on the gravel and stomps on it. 

"Sure. Let's say I'm your faggy soulmate. The fuck you wanted to see me for?"

"Well, I don't know, maybe because I never thought my soulmate would be a fucking asshole?"

Billy's eyes cut sharply to him. Harrington's face is torn with anger. 

"Because I did? The fuck are we supposed to do?"

"I don't know! I have no plan for this kind of situation! You were supposed to be cute and have boobs or whatever."

Billy snorts, doesn't look down to his pectorals. He doesn’t know what to do either. Well, he does; he just has to ignore Harrington for the remaining of his days and go off in the world, travel the sea maybe, it could be a thing. Never talk about the man he’s supposed to spend his life with. 

Thinking about it, makes him nauseous so Billy stops thinking about it. 

Harrington begins to pace by his car, steps murderous on the grass.

"I don't know, alright?" Harrington explodes suddenly. Billy tries not to flinch at the sudden outburst. "I don't know! You're my soulmate, I thought we could sort it out, fucking hell!"

"I fucking told you I'm not a queer. We don’t gotta do anything. No one gives a shit about us. I’m just going through this shit, you know, high school and shit, and I’m outta here. You’ll never see me again and you can be queer all you want after that.”

Before he has even stopped talking, Harrington is here, all in his space. Billy has to take a step back to not bump into him; he would never admit it out loud but he's terrified of what could happen if Steve touched him. He's not a fag. He doesn't want to have fag thoughts. 

"Shut the fuck up," Harrington says, eyes mean and mouth cruel. "I didn't want you for a soulmate either, alright? I wanted a girl, I wanted someone I could do shit with, you know? You don't get to crap all over me because I want to sort this out clean, alright?"

Billy takes a fortifying breath and decks him square in the jaw. 

"What the fuck, man!" screams Harrington, predictably. 

"Don't fucking come near me," spits Billy. "We don't gotta talk about it."

Harrington doesn't listen to him; he throws a punch, hits the meat of Billy's shoulder, doesn't really rattle him. Billy answers him with a backhand and he goes tumbling backward. 

"See you at school," Billy says as he gets into his car. 

Harrington is a cut-out figure of black in his rear view mirror. Billy tries to ignore the heat that burns at his nape, guilt tightening a slipknot around his neck. He pushes on the accelerator. 

It's only when he gets home, alone in his sleeping house, that he notices the blood on his knuckles. 

* * *

  
  


Harrington is on the basketball team but can't play for shit. It annoys Billy to no end.

It's fun to push him around for a little while, see him poke at his reddened jaw while he glares at the floor. But then, Harrington is on his back, breathing down his neck and doesn't move, doesn't go away despite the jabs and the hits and the shrill whistle of the coach at the end of practice.

He's a looming shadow at his shoulder, quiet but insistent and it takes Billy to elbow him for Harrington to leave him alone.

Billy was right to fear Harrington’s touch; it’s hot, a sizzling brand on his shoulder where he put a hand. He doesn’t know if it’s a soulmate thing; it must be. There’s no other reason for it. 

A week goes on. They don't speak a word of what happened between them (simply because nothing happened between them). Harrington listens and doesn’t talk to him. 

* * *

Life in Hawkins is awful and Max is about to put them in some seriously deep shit, running around town, breaking her curfew.

Billy shakes his shoulder, tries to loosen the joint, relieve the burn where his arm hit the wall. He doesn't curse his father; he's stopped doing that a lifetime ago. He only has got two years left, until he leaves; he will, if Maxine doesn't fuck everything up, sends him to the hospital with a broken spine.

If Karen Wheeler notes his discomfort, she doesn't remark on it. She bats her long eyelashes at him, hair stuck on her nape and offers him cookies with a giggle and the tilt of her head.

Billy barely looks at her; he hears "Byers" and "the kids" and he's on his way, Karen opening the door with her gown slipping on her shoulder.

Steve Harrington is here, roses in hand; immediately, it makes Billy itch for a fight. It’s only been a few hours since they saw each other, since Harrington tried to burn himself in his skin with touch alone. He wants to punch him, but Karen voices a surprised “Steve?” and Billy moves away from this line of thoughts. 

They stare at each other for all of ten seconds, where Billy tries to find something to say that can convey how much Billy doesn’t care for him. But his mind is blank and Billy shoulders him and carries on.

"Harrington," he mumbles, palms pressed against his jeans, wiping off sweat here. 

He's behind the wheel, engine already roaring when his passenger door opens, and Harrington slips in.

"What the fuck?" Billy screams, sufficiently floored to ease on the gas.

"What the fuck are you doing at my girlfriend's house?"

Billy looks to the door; Karen is watching them, barely covered by her silk robe, holding the bouquet. He grins like a shark, salutes her with his hand. She nods to him, face worried and scrunched up.

"Didn't know that the Wheeler bitch lived here," he says to Harrington, not leaving his eyes from her. "Her mother's hot. You going after her now?"

Harrington thumps him in the solar plexus, twice, before Billy gets a hold of his hand, squeezes until he sees him wince in his peripheral vision.

"Get the fuck out of my car."

Steve looks at him. Billy's gaze slides to his.

"No," he says, and there is a determination to the set of his jaw. "Fuck off, I'm tired of you pushing me around. We gotta talk about this shit... How you..."

Steve falters, looks away.

"How I wanna spend the rest of my life as far away from you as possible?"

Harrington doesn't say anything, bites his lip; it comes free from his teeth with a kissable shine to hit.

Billy shakes, releases his hand like a hot coal, cradles his in his lap. No, he doesn’t think that. Steve looks ridiculous. He glares at him, grits his teeth as he notes once more the big obnoxious hair and the moles; so many moles. He trembles for a second, getting gradually more certain that Harrington looks ridiculous. 

He still feels something tight in his throat. Clears it with a cough. Hopes Harrington hasn’t noted it. 

"You know what,” his voice breaks, “I don't have time for your shit," and he puts the car into gears.

Harrington makes a sound that Billy would use against him if he wasn't so preoccupied with everything else. He pushes on the accelerator and leaves Wheeler's nice neighborhood behind.

"The fuck are you doing? My car is back there!" screeches Harrington from the passenger seat.

"Can't you see, dumbass?"

He barks a laugh, too loud, sharp teeth in his mouth, but his heart is a fragile, panicked beast in his abdomen, skipping beats at his convenience. He hopes Harrington doesn't see it in the color of his eyes. Shit does the color change when he thinks shit? He cannot remember what his mother told him when he was a kid. 

He tries to push everything away, concentrates on the road.

Billy takes a sharp turn, and Harrington jams his arm against the door.

"Jesus, where the fuck are we going?"

Billy doesn't answer; Harrington repeats his questions two times before they reach their destination.

The Byers' house looks just as bad as his own shithole. Gravel crunches under his foot as he gets out of his car; there is light spilling out of the windows.

"Wait, isn't that Jonathan's house?"

Billy jumps on the porch, doesn't bother turning around to talk.

"Yeah? He your boyfriend? You suck his dick after school?"

Harrington gags behind him. Billy hears the floor creak, feels Harrington like a line of heat at his back; his heart gets louder. He shoves an elbow back to keep him at a distance.

He chokes on a breath. 

"Jesus, do you have to be so fucking violent all the time." It's not really a question. 

"I'm not a fag, don't get so fucking close to me."

Harrington doesn't answer and Billy doesn't wait for him. He knocks. Predictably no one answers. They wait. 

"What are we doing here by the way?"

Billy ignores him. 

"Maxine!" he screams. "If you're not out here in five seconds, I'll break this fucking door!"

He doesn't care if a parent is on the other side; he's already late, his father is already going to beat his nose in, he doesn't care about being proper. 

"Maxine!" he repeats when there is only squeaks and squawks on the other side of the door. "Five!"

"Maxine? Who's that, your girlfriend?"

Billy scoffs. 

"Step-sister, don't be fucking disgusting."

He grabs the handle and rattles it, thumps the wooden door with a fist. 

"Four!"

"Jesus, man, ease up on the door, you don't live here."

Billy sends a glare above his shoulder, bares his teeth in a leer. 

"Shut the fuck up, you can leave if it makes you uncomfortable."

Steve doesn't look cowed in the slightest, he juts his jaw and crosses his arms, disappointment etched in the curve of his lips. 

"You're such a fucking piece of work," he says, but doesn't prevent Billy from thumping some more. 

Three and Two go by without an answer. Billy rolls his shoulder; it's smarting, but he can probably break the door down. He takes a step back, leans on his right foot, gets ready to charge.

And Harrington is all over him in a hot second, pushing a hand on his chest, skin so hot, it's bruising. 

Billy takes another step back, can't find the instinct to slap his hand away, let it fall as he moves back. Fury rises in his throat. He clings to his anger with tenacity, pulls it over him like a cloak, pushes everything else away. Doesn't let the shake of his rabbit-fast heart fluster him. He's not _queer_.

"The fuck is wrong with you?"

He swallows the space between them with renewed confidence. 

"The fuck is wrong with _you_?" Steve asks, backpedaling quickly, back hitting the door. "You can't charge at people's doors like that!" He's screaming now, reaching a level of hysterics Billy doesn't think anyone should be capable of.

Billy grabs Steve around the collar. 

"Listen, Harrington, I don't get why you bother me all day long, but you gotta stop caring about what doesn't concern you."

They don't talk for a second; Harrington has a hand wrapped around his wrist. He squeezes; it doesn't hurt that much. 

"You don't get why?" He spits, his breath kissing Billy's cheeks. "You’re my fucking soulmate. I wanna know why the fuck you are my fucking soulmate."

Billy can't talk for a minute; he doesn't have to. The door opens and Harrington and him stumble in the hall, face first. 

Harrington is very close when Billy realizes that he has fallen; Steve has his nose pressed to his throat and Billy fumbles to get vertical quickly, clears his throat without looking at him flopped on the floor, looking baffled. Instead, he turns to the waxy kid who opened the door. 

"Where the fuck is Maxine?" he asks, teeth sharp around his tongue. 

The kid shakes but doesn't move, doesn't divert his gaze. 

"We need your car," he says, and Billy almost slaps him across the face. 

"Where the fuck is the brat?" he repeats and steps forward, is met with the steely determination of a kid throwing a tantrum. 

Billy is ready to push him around a little bit, throw him against a wall to clear the way, but Steve is once again on him, invading his personal space like poison ivy. 

"Mike, what is going on?"

The kid looks at him all grave and shit from under his Beatles haircut. 

"We have to save Eleven and Hopper."

  
  


* * *

  
  
  


Billy couldn't possibly explain to anyone how he got roped up in burning down foul tunnels which lead straight to hell. He doesn't think anyone would actually believe him, as he smashes through blood and gore, demon tentacles screeching inches away from his wrists; Harrington is pulling at his collar, choking him and screeching that they have to go. 

They have never agreed more on something. 

Billy isn't actually quite certain of how he got there; there was a lot of shouting, a terrified Harrington and Maxine's promise to skate from and to home everyday until New Year. Then, he was jumping through a pumpkin patch, breathing through a cloth over his mouth and feeling like gagging at every inhalation. 

Facing a terrifying four-legged monster. 

Billy doesn't scream, but it's a near thing; he stumbles back into Harrington, feels a hand wrap around his bicep, and a tug, the scorching heat of him at his back. He tightens his grip on the bat, gets ready to swing it at the slimy beast. 

But Weird-and-Curly steps up, crooning and cooing at the beast, and Harrington pulls him closer, shuffles his feet because he can never plant them anywhere. 

The thing leaves them alone. Billy chokes on relief and stench. 

"Fucking hell, let's get out of here."

Harrington is still holding him and Billy shrugs his hand off, doesn’t let himself think about it, traipses over writhing tentacles in what he hopes is the right direction. Harrington doesn't correct him and he's the one with the map. 

They eventually get to the hole, and Billy reluctantly hoists the kids out. He's gotten Max up when a snarl shakes the tunnels; dread blooms in his chest. He shares a look with Harrington, feels his own terror reflected in his eyes. 

Harrington shakes, but he grabs the last kid and says, "come on, help me get him out."

Weird-and-Curly struggles, but they send him up all the same, just in time to see the first monster careening in their direction. Billy lifts the bat, sees the nails glint in his peripheral vision. 

He can already feel them crawling all over him, sees them swell in numbers. He realizes suddenly that he's not going to get out of here alive; and it's a ball of lead sinking in his stomach. No blue, no ocean, no shades of cool around his calves. 

Harrington grabs at him and Billy turns into him, clenches a hand in his jacket, looks into his eyes; he can't see shit in the dark, can't see his face behind the mask, but he finds, in this few last seconds of his life, that he remembers their color. Maybe he should be okay with dying with this kind of knowledge. He really isn't; he wants to know so much more. 

The snarls are here, close and closer; Billy expects pain. 

Instead, they brush against his calves, smear slime on his jeans, leave without taking a bite of his toes. Billy isn't breathing, doesn't think there is room for his lungs in his chest; his heart is jumping everywhere, so loud that he doesn't hear Harrington's screams. 

Somehow, at the end of it all, they're still alive. They're still alive and Billy is clutching at Steve's clothes like a lifeline, fabric straining around his fingers. 

"Jesus," he says, and lets go. His heart trips over itself. He doesn't know if it's about the monsters or Harrington's closeness anymore. 

Billy takes a step back, briefly looks over at Steve; he's shaking, but he's stopped screaming, swears with creativity while looking at the retreating hell-spawned demons. 

"Come on, let's go," Billy says, and it sounds very soft, muffled by the cloth around his face and the decay around them. 

Harrington nods, tips his head back to look at the kids. He's immediately blinded by a flashlight. 

"Jesus, don't stare at us. Send some rope for Christ's sake," he complains. 

They get out. Weird-and-Curly does a weird hug-frog-marching-Steve-to-his-car, wailing that he saved his life, when Billy did the exact same thing and doesn't get anything. Not that he wants anything. But. There could at least be an attempt at thanking him or shit. 

He looks around at the kids, and they look at him in turn. Billy feels weirdly empty, feels like he's now considered the responsible one. He doesn't want this kind of shit. He wants to bag it out of here as soon as possible. 

He has no fucking clue what to do in these kind of situation. So, he digs in his pocket, pulls out his keys and says:

“Come on, dickwads, let’s get the fuck home.”

They share a sort of weary nod and turn to the vehicle, only to be blinded by the headlights, burning the world down to their retinas. 

Harrington only has the time to screech a “WHAT THE FUCK,” before it’s over and they’re left blinking back dark spots in their vision. 

“Well… That was weird,” says Sinclair. Billy ignores him in favor of getting behind the wheel, he doesn’t give a fuck anymore. He just saw dog-demons trying to use him as a climbing wall and he probably lost hearing in an ear from all of Harrington’s screeching. 

No one follows him. Billy curses. Window open, he thumps on the outside of his door. 

“I’m leaving, so get the fuck in!”

How a gaggle of teenagers and one Steve Harrington fit into his car will always belong to the category of mysteries Billy will never unearth, but he gets them on the road in record time, swallowing the distance between him and the beating his father will serve him. 

It’s not a pleasant thought, so Billy tries not to look into it too much. He clenches his teeth and looks at the road, a world of black and white beyond the windshield, familiar and still full of possibilities. 

He gets them home. 

  
  


* * *

  
  


He doesn’t leave the house for a week after. 

It’s not too bad, he tells himself while looking in the bathroom mirror. His eyes are swollen shut for two days, but beyond that, everything is alright. The colored fingers tightened around his throat aren’t quite visible after five nights and Billy wrangles himself in a shirt and his jacket, mindful of his ribs and gets in his car. Maxine has already left; he’ll probably go in for second period, he isn’t that eager to get to school. 

He drives slowly around town, enters the school parking lot with the last ring of the period. 

Everyone is already seated when he goes through the door; Mr. Johnson does a double-take and wheezes a long sigh. 

“Jesus, Hargrove, you shouldn’t have been here for long enough to cause trouble.”

Billy pushes a smirk out; it hurts his bruised jaw. 

“Sorry, Teach, I fell down the stairs.”

Johnson stares at him for a while, sighs once more; Billy feels scrutinized. He’s used to being observed, but Johnson looks like he sees past the cocky grin, the confident lean of his body, the illusion of a predator at rest. For five seconds, Billy feels like a kid. Then, Johnson looks away and gestures to the packed classroom.

Billy goes to his usual seat, right in front of Harrington and tries to ignore his look. 

The hour is fucking long, and made unbearable by the holes Harrington is drilling into the back of his skull. If Billy could turn around without screaming in agony, he probably would. For now, breathing and sitting in his aloof sprawl is a real feat, so he concentrates on doing just that. 

When the bell rings, Harrington is at his side, not leaving him the time to get out of his chair and already trying to corner him. 

Jesus, try to save a guy’s life once and he’ll be needy for the fucking remaining of his days. 

“What?” Billy snaps, doesn’t try to stand up; knows that he will wince in the process, and under too much scrutiny for it be swept under the rug. 

“You haven't come to school for a while.”

Billy doesn’t even look at him, scratches a line on the table with his nail. 

“Yeah, well, maybe I was tired of your face or something.”

Harrington is silent for a beat; Billy knows him enough to know how fucking rare that is. It doesn’t last long. 

“The fuck happened to you? You didn’t look like that the last time I saw you.”

Billy clears his throat; it still hurts when he does that. He turns a little to Harrington, hopes he didn’t remember the color of his eyes. 

“Didn’t hear? Fell down the stairs.”

Steve’s mouth gets all tight at the corners. 

“I call bullshit.”

Billy stands up; he has braced himself for the pain but it still shortens his breath. It takes him a few seconds to loom all over Harrington. He doesn’t seem all that impressed; Billy can’t really blame him. It annoys him all the same. 

“What if it is? Wanna hold my hand again?” He spits. 

Harrington physically recoils, flushes deeply. Billy knows it; it’s red, it stains him from neck to forehead. He looks away before he can begin to enjoy naming it. 

“ _Fuck you_.”

And he leaves the classroom, somehow succeeding at looking murderous in his steps. Billy doesn’t think of the traitorous beat of his heart.


	2. Chocolate

Steve doesn’t really intend to buy the book. He remembers nursing his split lip, taping frozen peas to the wound to have the swelling go down, wrapping himself in a blanket and turning the TV on. And then suddenly he is parking in front of a bookstore two towns over, the light of the day close to a memory.

The worker there tells him they were closing; and Steve, alone and confused Steve, says, “Uh, yeah, sorry. I just… I’m just looking for… a book of colors?”

He must look pitiful enough, because she doesn’t ask any questions. Steve expects the hit of “how did you meet your soulmate?”, the blow of “is she as beautiful as you ever thought she would be?”, the sting of “is your favorite color the one of her eyes?”

Instead, she silently pushes a book in his hand and rings him up quickly, smiles very small at the corner of her mouth. 

Steve wishes she was his soulmate instead. He thanks the skies that she didn’t congratulate him; he must look properly miserable. 

The book sits heavy in his hand and he pushes himself in his seat, looks over the blackened parking lot, worries his wounded lip with his teeth. 

He wishes that Billy Hargrove was a woman. Any woman, really. He wishes he could still have a soulmate; he can never have a life with a man, this kind of thing doesn’t happen. 

He thinks of opening the book. Finding the names to the colors. He thinks of Billy’s eyes. 

He drives back to Hawkins instead. 

* * *

  
The book sits on his bedside table for forever. Steve can barely look at it. 

* * *

The night he gets back from the Byers, worse for wear, he doesn't pause to look at the taut tiredness of his face; he sees the vague shape of his pale face as he passes by the mirror at the bottom of the stairs and hurries to his bathroom. Steve locks himself in, despite being the only one in his house, and doesn't look up to meet his reflection. Tugs at the sticky fabric of his shirt, shucks his clothes into a heap and scrambles in his shower, nearly burning himself with the water. 

He doesn't move once before the water becomes tepid. Then, as it gets colder, he squirts shampoo into his hand and lathers his head, does the same with soap, blinks back the prickles of tears in his eyes; tells himself it's the shampoo and only the shampoo. 

When he finally gets out, he’s wracked with shivers, bundled in towels and still feeling slimy. He knows dawn isn't far, that he should pull the curtains closed, get some sleep; but Steve sits on his bed and looks at the night beyond his window, scrutinizes the weird shapes made by his pool lights until first light. Then, he lays down and cries himself to sleep. 

* * *

  
As a week goes by, and he signs NDA after NDA, Steve has almost convinced himself that Billy Hargrove isn't an asshole when he doesn’t show up to school. He is actually eaten with worry, like a bad apple welcoming a worm to be devoured. 

He immediately changes his opinion as soon as he sees him, purple with bruises and red with anger. The classroom is stifling with the need to punch him across the face; Steve doesn’t because Billy looks like he’s had enough violence staining his cheeks. 

Between Nancy mooning over Jonathan across the cafeteria and Billy being infuriatingly loud two tables over, Steve feels like he ought to leave the school grounds for the day. 

He stops by the nurse's office directly after lunch and coughs into his fist as he talks to her; he knows how tired he looks, and she eats it up like shortcake. 

It's not even one in the afternoon when he slides behind the wheel in the direction of his house. 

His parents are wonderfully absent for the weekend and Steve peels off his jeans in the entrance hall, chucks them in the vague direction of the stairs to be picked up later and makes his way to the kitchen. He opens a bag of Doritos and sprawls in front of his TV, zaps through documentaries and Christmas movies. He stops when he suddenly stumbles upon a colored movie and sits up. 

Steve feels weirdly blank at the thought of colors now; his color book sits untouched on his bedside table. He knows very rationally that he doesn't have a soulmate. Hargrove is just "the guy who saw colors at the same time as him" there's nothing else to it. He will not get a happy ending with a fated wife, kids and white picket fence. 

It leaves a weird taste in his mouth, something akin to ash. 

Steve wallows for a bit in front of the movie, stands up several times to get chips, a can of coke, wash his hands. It's not even been ten minutes when he shuts the TV off, leaves everything as it is, crumbs and condensation circles on the coffee table, and crawls to his room.

He throws himself on his bed and looks at the ceiling. His skin feels weirdly clammy and Steve wonders for a small second if he really is sick. He touches his forehead with the back of his hand and doesn't feel a difference.

He looks up, surrounded by a silence so complete, it buzzes in his ears and suddenly feels very lonely.

He has no girlfriend to call, no friend to rely on. He's trapped in a big house where his parents wander as ghosts once in a blue moon and surrounded by tall woods that tried to eat him twice already. 

He doesn't feel anger anymore; he's been numbed to it the moment he saw Nancy's hand in Jonathan's at the beginning of the week, not even ten days after their informal break-up. He just feels sad. 

He really has turned bitch.

He feels the tell-tale prickle at his eyelids when his doorbell rings and shakes him out of his pity party. 

"Yeah?" he calls even though he's still in his room. 

They ring again and Steve begrudgingly goes down the stairs, retrieves his jeans and pulls them on with a limited amount of stumbling. 

"Yeah?" he repeats when he opens the door. 

Toothless Dustin looks up at him from under his baseball cap. 

"Hey, I was around and I thought I would see if you were home or not, well I guess you are." He gesticulates a lot with his hands. "Anyway, it was just to thank you for, you-know-what last week and how you saved my life, it was pretty neat."

Steve stares for a little bit too long, sees Dustin squirm and twitches. 

"Hmm." He doesn't really know what to say; that must be why he doesn't have any friends, he can never use his words when needed.

"Anyway, it's getting kind of chilly outside, so, um, do you... Wanna hang out or something? I have chocolate bars in there", he pats his backpack, "and I could really do with a movie right now."

Steve doesn't have a clue what he did to have a barely teen gremlin on his porch; King Steve would have already pushed the kid away and slammed the door in his face. 

He takes a step back and lets him in. 

* * *

Dustin is a weird kid, with the tendency to eat him out of house and home, but also probably the nicest human being Steve has ever met. He surprises himself by looking forward to the afternoons spent with him, and then later on, as days lengthen, with the rest of the party. 

Summer is around the corner when he realizes with the prickly help of his dad that he's not going to make it into college. He's pushed out of the house one morning with a set of resumes in his hands and the implicit instructions of finding a job before he will be allowed back home. 

He gets something at an ice-cream parlor and has a ridiculous hat to wear, but his father’s scowl lessens enough to leave for his business trip and Steve is once again blessedly alone. He throws himself on his couch and tries not to cry; tells himself that he cannot see the monsters beyond his fence if everything is blurry.

He then thinks that colors make it easier to see in the dark and tries not to think of Billy. 

They haven't talked for nearly eight months beyond the occasional grunt and elbow to the ribs during basketball practice. Steve thinks they probably won't speak again; it has stopped leaving a bitter taste in his mouth. He doesn't need a soulmate to be happy; he can just live his life like so many other people before him; find a nice wife that sees in monochrome, or better yet, one that shares his burden, one that doesn't have a good soulmate... a biologically compatible one, or one who is fated to a cannibal maybe. 

Nancy would have been perfect for him. She would have made his mom so happy. 

Steve sighs and hides his face in the cushions; he doesn't really think about her anymore, aside from the occasional passing spike of anger or misplaced guilt about her not being his soulmate. 

Sometimes, he wonders if Jonathan isn't her soulmate and that is why she left him, to be with her fated one. But then he remembers that she would have seen the world of colors long before him and would have probably never dated him. 

He wallows in his misery all of ten minutes before deciding to go on a ride; the sun hasn't set yet, and the air is mild, the day beautiful; a typical evening in June. 

He thinks about going to the quarry, but remembers as he gets into his car that all of the seniors are partying before going off to college and he is in absolutely no mood to see any of those dickheads. 

He takes the highway instead, and drives. The light of early evening is warm on his cheek, honeyed with streaks of orange, made all the more vivid with the reality that it's probably his last day as a free man, before active life and the headache it inspires in him. 

He doesn't take long before he chooses a destination and he pulls in front of a liquor store, two towns over and whips out his fake ID; it's a really bad one, but no one cards him here anyway. 

Armed with a bottle of bourbon, Steve takes to the road, drives until the sun is a vague impression in the night sky, a halo of yellow on the horizon. 

He spends a long time deciding that he doesn't really know where he's going, and longer even to go back to Hawkins; he isn't yet back in his house, but he already feels the all-encompassing loneliness of the tall walls and echoing halls. He doesn't go home. It's not really home anyway. 

He ends up pulling up to the arcade, feels like his car would be less suspicious here than anywhere else. People are used to him picking up the kids; they won't care if the kids are actually at the Wheeler’s. 

The bright lights of the games ricochet on his windshield, Steve reaches for the bottle and doesn't let himself think of how pathetic he is. Burns all his sadness down with a steady flow of liquor. 

He is working a nice buzz, radio spitting a half-static, half-George Michael song, when someone knocks at his window; some alcohol sloshes on his jeans as he scrambles to hide the bottle, hair in his eyes. He hopes to God that it's not Hopper. 

Billy Hargrove stands there, half of his face in shadows and Steve feels anxiety knot his vocal cords together. He cannot talk. 

He opens his window and stares. 

"What are you doing around here so late, Harrington?" Steve tightens his hands into fists. "You up to no good?"

Steve coughs in his fist and Billy wrinkles his nose, sneer curving his lips. 

"Jesus, have you been drinking?"

Steve doesn't answer, Billy is grinning now, Cheshire cat who got the cream, or whatever. 

"Are you getting drunk alone?"

He closes his eyes, counts to ten and hopes that at the end of the countdown, he will be able to punch Billy in the face. 

"Harrington," and there is something almost careful in his voice. "Are you actually drinking alone?"

"Shut up," Steve chokes out and he feels the bite of his nails in his palms. "It's none of your fucking business, is it?"

Billy sighs, and Steve, eyes still closed, hears his steps on the gravel, moving away. He exhales heavily and slouches. 

His passenger door is pulled open and his car wobbles; Billy looks at him from the other side of the stick. 

"The fuck are you doing?" he screeches, and berates himself for the height of his voice. 

Billy raises both eyebrows. 

"The fuck does it look like I'm doing? I'm drinking with you." 

And he dives between the V of Steve's leg, fishes out the bottle and takes a heavy swing. 

Steve is completely paralyzed by the vision of Billy sinking over his lap. He shakes himself out of it. 

"Why the fuck would you do that?"

Billy looks at him; and his eyes are very blue, even in the darkness. Steve knows the color now, it was in his book, alongside the line ‘Your soulmate's eyes are…’

He clears his throat, turns away from it.

"For leisure." 

Steve scoffs, tries to concentrate on the bright lights in the arcade. 

"Why the hell are you even here? Isn't there a party for you somewhere?"

Billy doesn't answer for a while and the liquid sloshes in the bottle, the only sound to distract them from the heavy veil that keeps them silent. 

"There's a thing at the quarry, actually."

Steve sighs and rips the bottle from his hands, burning his throat with the fire of alcohol. 

"Why don't you fuck off on your way, then?" His voice is very deep, he notes distantly, alcohol sloshed-gravel on his vocal cords. 

Billy just looks at him, does his weird thing with his tongue he never seems to notice. Steve rolls his eyes, takes another sip. 

"Seriously. Go away, you don't wanna be here."

Billy takes back the bottle for a mouthful, sets it down between them at a haphazard balance. Steve steals it and cradles it in his arms, tries to glare at him without actually looking at Billy. It suddenly occurs to him that he's quite drunk. 

"What are you doing next year?" Billy asks and Steve feels his stomach sink like an anchor. 

He grimaces and sloshes more alcohol down his throat. It mellows down the surge of anxiety that had been rising. 

"Why do you care?"

Billy shrugs, rubs the bridge of his nose. 

"Dunno. You graduated. Just asking."

Steve scoffs. 

"Yeah, barely."

The bourbon somehow ends up in Billy’s hands once more. Steve reaches for it, knocks Billy's fingers off of it.

"I paid for this," he says when he feels him resist, manages to stain his shirt with alcohol. 

"Jesus, you're a mess, man."

Steve laughs, it's something empty and sad, it echoes within the hole in his chest.

"Yeah, don't I know that."

Billy sighs. Steve drinks. They stay silent for a solid minute. 

"I haven't seen you at any party, Harrington."

"Haven't been to one."

One of the games creates an arch of oranges and reds, blinking in and out of existence. Steve focuses on that instead of looking at Billy. 

"Why not?"

Steve sighs and takes a long drink. He should really stop; he's getting more maudlin by the second and he didn't start in the happiest mood. 

"Yeah? Why the fuck would I go to one? You're their king now. What's the point?"

Billy shifts; he hears it in the crack of the leather. 

"The point is to have fun."

Steve scoffs, looks at Billy for half a second before turning back to bright lights, squashes the spike of hunger for companionship in his stomach that the sight of his soulmate creates. Steve frowns. 

Billy isn't his soulmate.

"Yeah, well, no. They're not really fun. It's a party in Hawkins, how good could it be?"

Billy snorts.

"I thought you were born here."

Steve turns to Billy, sees the smooth swell of his cheekbones bathed in bright red. He swallows. 

"I was. How do you know that?" Billy turns to him and his gaze makes heat crawl from under his collar to the planes of his face. He clears his throat. "Whatever, there is no one to talk to there anyway."

"What about Chad? Or Justin? Aren't they your friends or something?"

Steve turns to his window, props his wobbly head on his hand. 

"Or something. We played basketball together. Big deal."

Billy doesn't answer for a long time. When he finally talks, it's so quiet that Steve almost misses it. 

"There’s me."

Steve turns to him so fast that his neck twinges. Billy evades his gaze, his profile is cut in moving shadows and Steve cannot read him at all. He almost reaches out; he takes a swing of the bottle instead. 

There is something hot and messy pushing at his lungs; Steve wants to hide from it, tug his blankets above his head and never think of it ever again.

_But you don’t want to see me, Billy._

He wets his lips, corks the bottle closed. 

"Okay, fuck off, I'm going home."

Billy snorts; Steve feels his eyes on his cheek; it burns like a touch. 

"Yeah, not happening man."

A coil of anger rises behind his ribs, licks at his beating heart, ignites a fire here. Steve feels himself redden. 

"You're going to keep me from going home?"

Billy reaches for his keys in the ignition; Steve isn't fast enough to stop him. They dangle from his fingers, out of his reach. 

"You're wasted, I'm not letting you drive."

Steve looks at him, tries to appear really sober and not awfully crossed-eyed. 

"You're not driving my car."

Billy raises an eyebrow. Steve distantly wonders how he can do that. 

"Then get out, we're taking mine."

He grits his teeth, feels his knuckles itch with the urge to fight. 

"No."

"Yes."

Steve huffs out a breath, feels defeat like a presence in the car. He slouches back against his seat and presses the heels of his hands in his eyes until he sees spots of dark. 

"Fuck off."

"If you wanna get home tonight, you better get your ass out soon. I'm taking your keys with me."

And Billy gets out of the car, slams the door behind him. 

Steve sighs and thumps his skull on his headrest. 

"Why do you care?" he asks to the silence. He gets no answer.

Billy is leaning against the hood when Steve finally exits his car, door clutched tight in his hand to prevent himself from meeting the ground. Billy doesn't move to help him, simply pushes Steve aside to lock the car.

He nods in the direction of the Camaro. Steve follows him with minimal stumbling, somehow managing not to plant himself face-first. He slides in the passenger seat and only registers that Billy had held the door open for him when he's sprawled on the butter-soft leather. He wrinkles his nose in confusion. 

"Barf in my car and I'll pull your teeth out with my bare hands," Billy threatens, almost conversational. 

Steve rolls the window down and doesn't answer, tries to convey his discontentment with sulky silence. 

Weirdly, Billy knows where he lives and doesn't ask for direction. The ride is quiet, save for the whistle of warm air through the windows and the distant rumble of thunder at the horizon. 

Steve loses himself in his own head. Thinks of what could have been if his life were like a book; one of those awful love stories they study in English literature, where he would have swept a pretty young lady off her feet, where loving her would have been right. 

Steve clenches his teeth; he feels like screaming. His soulmate is inches away and somehow unreachable. It's unfair. It's a promise of sorrow for the rest of his life. It feels too heavy for the width of his shoulders. 

Steve closes his eyes for fear of actually crying. 

"Harrington, you're here."

The car goes quiet under him and Steve opens his eyes to find his house, cut in deep shadows. He doesn't move, stares at it. 

"For fuck's sake."

The car jostles, and Steve turns to witness Billy slamming his door close. His own opens and Steve almost spills on the concrete, is held back by an iron grip on his shoulder. 

"Jesus, how fucking drunk are you?"

Probably more than he should be knowing he has to work the next day. Christ, he had forgotten about that.

Sheer will doesn't stop him from tripping and only Billy’s strong hold of him keep him from breaking his nose on the lovely paved pathway his mother had renovated the last time she had spent a weekend home. 

"Fucking hell," Billy says and Steve is close enough to feel his breath on his ear. Something uneasy and hot twists in his chest. 

Billy frog-marches him to the door, taking some of his weight without cursing too much, heat seeping through Steve's jacket. He swallows again the knot of anxiety in his throat, the very same that makes his fingers feel like a brand. 

They stand under the porch, deep in shadows, a half moon giving a vague shape to Billy. Steve blinks at the door. 

"Jesus," and Billy shakes him a little, more gently than Steve would have expected. "Where the fuck are you keys?"

"Ah." He pats his pocket with the sensation of shifting through molasses. They’re empty. 

Steve looks at Billy; in the moonlight, the bridge of his nose looks very straight, a shark fin above the tumultuous sea of his face, the frustration of his eyebrows, the careful stiffness of his mouth. He looks away. 

“They’re with my car keys,” he slurs, words so small against the knot in his throat. 

“What?” asks Billy and Steve doesn’t try to talk again, doesn’t feel like he has room for voice in his lungs. 

He goes for Billy’s pocket with the straightest face he can muster, tries to ignore the way his mouth dries at the thought of deliberate contact with him. 

Billy makes a sound that Steve would qualify of squeal if he didn’t want to live another day, but seems too surprised to do anything to Steve. The sharp ridge of his key digs into his thumb and Steve fishes them out with great difficulty, tries not to think of Billy’s thighs, or the heat of his skin.

“Christ,” Billy swears and his Adam’s apple bobs like an invitation. 

Steve feels like the world stops for a second, like he’s been dunked in an alternative reality made of caramel and syrup, limbs heavy and clumsy. Something burns in his chest; it’s sweet; it feels like desire.

Billy doesn't wait for him snap out of it and try. He takes the key, pushes it in the lock and opens the door with rigid movements. 

Steve hasn't realized he's been holding on to Billy before the he steps away and Steve almost falls on his face. 

"Shit," and Billy is right here, propping him against the door frame with an arm around his waist. 

Steve takes hold of Billy's jacket by reflex and his heart skyrockets to his throat, beats there and steals room for his words, squeezes them to a feeble and meaningless noise. Billy's arm around him is burning him through the fabric, licking fire that eats at his skin and Steve sucks in a short breath. 

He doesn't see much of Billy's face; just the hard cut of his jaw and his cheekbones, high and bathed with a sliver of light from the moon. He cannot see his eyes and the sky-blue of them, cannot read the disgust of him standing so close to another man, or maybe, maybe a flicker of hope. Steve doesn't know and that's why he gets closer. 

He is careful, goes very slowly, braces himself for a fist in his nose or a shove to get him off. He doesn't know if Billy is aware of what's happening and if he is, why he's not stopping it. 

Had he been sober, he would have never even thought of kissing Billy. 

Steve slots their lips together and doesn't expect the wave of heat that crashes into him very suddenly, the surge of want that tightens his belly and gets him to tug at Billy, gets him closer. 

Billy, to the biggest surprise, complies. He is so very hot, a terrible furnace against Steve's front; it gets worse when Billy is suddenly here, opening up his mouth for Steve with a choked-up sound. 

Steve fears that he won't be able to stand for long. His legs are utterly useless under him and he suspects that Billy's arms, tight around his ribs, are the only thing keeping him from falling into a heap. 

Steve may be melting, lips burned with the rasp of sharp stubble, fingers slipped into soft curls, waist held immobile by a proprietary hand. He may die from asphyxiation, but he refuses to come up for air. 

He feels Billy pull away and shamelessly chases after him with a whine, tightens the knuckles he has in his hair to keep him there. Billy groans in his mouth, presses closer and Steve realizes that he had restrained himself up until now when Billy melds himself to him, so hard and so close that Steve feels like he will have bruises in the morning. 

Billy pushes and pushes, still tugs him closer and Steve feels entirely disconnected from reality, as if he had suddenly stumbled in another reality entirely and he lets himself be ripped apart by Billy's wet lips, nails scratching at his scalp. 

Billy scorches him with a hand on his skin, pushed under his polo-shirt; it's embers at his back, and Steve moans, bucks his hips without meaning to. 

It seems to break the spell. Steve doesn't have the time to form a complaint that Billy is already several feet away. 

"Shit," he says. 

And Steve chokes on words, tries to say _something_ but Billy is off the porch, looking wide-eyed and panicked under the moonlight. 

"Shit," he repeats, and leaves. 

Steve feels very cold, head spinning with how fast everything ended. He sinks to the floor and tries to breathe. 

* * *

The next day, as Steve emerges from his house with bleary eyes and the intent to catch his bus on time, he finds his keys in his mailbox. There is no note. 

He doesn't see Billy for a month. He tries not to think about it; he's mostly made peace with the idea of never going near him ever again. There is no way Billy is okay with what they did and Steve would prefer not to have his nose broken by seeking him. He doesn't look for him; not even when his gaze lingers at the corners of the grocery store, catching a shadow, an illusion. 

As summer warms the asphalt, the days seem to trickle like honey, thick and heavy and Steve cannot catch a break. His job is miserable, he spends his days being written off as a loser by everyone, including his co-worker Robin, who was just as much a loser as he was anyway, and Steve is just about done with it. 

But he tried bringing up the subject of quitting his job the last time he and his Dad sat at the dining table around a charred roast and, with a look alone, Steve had understood that he would be kicked out of the house if he so much as arrived late to Scoops. 

It's worse than being in school and staring at a white board for hours on end; now he actually has things to do. 

Robin is an awful reminder of his failures. She's still, annoyingly, in high school and better at their job than he will ever be, the cash register like an extension of her hand. 

Steve wasn't made for scooping; he doesn't know exactly what he was made for, but it certainly wasn't that. 

He's alone on the Sunday afternoon shift, perched on a counter, reading some comics a kid left behind after the lunch rush in the back room. The separating window open so that he can attend to clients as they come when someone pointedly clears their throat. 

Billy stands behind the counter and Steve almost falls face first at the sight of him. He thankfully doesn't break anything, but his sneakers squeal on the linoleum as he gets back in the serving room, heart in his throat. 

Billy hasn't disappeared, looks at him with ice-cold detachment. He works his jaws and Steve stares. 

"I'm here with my family," he says and indicates them with a movement of his head. "They’re coming in a sec."

Steve doesn't stop staring. Billy looks wound so tight, shirt buttoned-up and no dangly earring, it doesn't agree with the last impression he had of him, smooth and soft and burning under his mouth. 

"Steve," he hisses, low and tense. “Don’t…”

They’re interrupted by Max and her parents coming in. Steve realizes then that Max has a striking ressemble with her mother; he cannot find anything of Billy in the man standing next to her. 

The man steadily looks at him back and Steve feels a great wave of heat burns its way to his cheeks. He shakes himself and nods. 

"Welcome to Scoops Ahoy," he greets with a good amount of fake cheer. 

Max comes up next to Billy and stands shoulder to shoulder with him; they each look a mix of grateful and murderous about it, it’s jarring. Billy's parents look like a regular couple on a Sunday after church, neat and tidy, clothes pressed and nails manicured. 

“Ah, a brave young man working after church on a Sunday. That’s an example you should follow, Billy.”

Steve falters behind the counter, blinks at the patriarch. 

“Hmm,” and Billy turns to him so fast, his nape twinges in commiseration, “I mean no disrespect, sir, but I haven’t gone to church in years.”

A silence settles on the room, cold as a winter night. Billy’s dad stares at him, and it feels heavy and unyielding. Steve swallows thickly, tries to remember what he’s supposed to do. 

Steve serves them the welcome spiel like through a fog, grin forced and flourish of the hands included and Billy's dad looks at him up and down with a frown so dense, Steve fears his eyebrows will never detach themselves from each other. 

"What would you like to order?"

Billy is a rigid block of ice, looking at his father with barely concealed apprehension. Steve feels anxiety rise in his chest; it doesn’t seem good for Billy to be scared of something. 

"I would like a Banana Split," says Billy's step-mom and Steve bobs his head like a robot, goes to begin putting the desert together. 

Maxine orders a complicated custom ice-cream, and Steve tries to commit everything to memory, a good distraction from the gaze of the old man, piercing and mean, even from behind a window display. 

"What about you, sir?" he asks, turning to the older man. 

Billy, impossibly, becomes more immobile. 

"I'm not eating any of your ice-cream," he spits. 

It's an insult, but Steve hasn't quite worked out how; he sees Billy redden from the corner of his eyes and tries not to gape too long. 

"Of course, sir," he answers finally, because he doesn't really have any idea of what's happening. 

He turns to Billy, sees him swallow thickly. He's looking somewhere above Steve's shoulder. 

"Yeah, I'm good, thanks."

Steve nods and doesn’t comment on it. 

“Alright, why don’t you find yourselves a table I’ll bring everything over when I’m done?”

Billy’s dad doesn’t look like he want to move an inch, but his wife stears him to a place near the back and Steve is blessedly left alone for a moment. 

He scoops more slowly than he usually does, keeping an eye on the table from under his lashes. They're silent, but Billy and his Dad look half-way through an argument, the latter wound so tight, that his fists are a white-knuckled weight on the table. 

Steve tries to keep his face amiable as he brings the ice-cream over. 

"Well, here you go, ladies! Anything else I can help you with?"

Billy's step-mom politely replies "no, thanks," and Max dives in so Steve takes it as the dismissal it is. He takes a step back. 

"What did you just call me?"

Steve straightens up and turns to Billy's dad, feels his joints locked in blocks of ice. He opens his mouth; no sound comes out of it. 

"Did you just call me a lady?"

Steve blinks, moistens his lips. 

"Uh, no? I was talking-"

"Did you think that I came here to look at your faggot skirt? Did you think I was a queer like you?"

Steve takes a step back; something loud beats in his ears; it's his heart. 

"Uhm, sir, I didn't-"

"Come on, Dad, he didn't do anything."

There is ice in his lungs when his father turns to Billy, like a hawk turning to its prey. Steve feels the unexpected urgency to step between them and act like a buffer; he can't get his feet to move, they're stuck in molasses. 

"How did you talk to me, William?" Billy doesn't answer, grips the border of the table with white knuckles. "You care to repeat that, son?" and somehow, it sounds meaner than an insult. 

"Come on, honey," begins Billy's step-mom, but she's cut off before she's even tried.

"We're leaving."

And he stands sharply, eyes trailed on Billy. 

"You'll face the consequences of your actions at home."

Billy juts his jaw but nods and his father leaves the store, doesn't turn around to see if anyone is following him. 

His step-mom looks after him for a moment before standing up, coaxing her kids with a very soft "come on, children, we're going home."

Billy stands up, lets Max follow her mom with a murderous glare to the floor. 

Billy stares at the table top, looking like a statue, anger curving the marble around his eyes. He works his jaw a few times. Steve wants to kiss the fury off of him.

"Uh," Steve says, helpfully. 

Billy shakes his head, sighs heavily and digs in his pockets. He throws some crumpled bills on the table. 

"Sorry, about that." He looks finally at Steve and... stares. Steve feels anticipation knots his throat closed; he cannot speak. "Yeah, sorry. Take care." 

And he leaves. It feels awfully anti climatic. 

Steve stands there for a long while, chewing on his lip as he looks at the melting unfinished ice-cream and the couple of bills sadly balled up, staring at him like he's weird for wanting his soulmate to... react. 

A single mom with two kids appears, and Steve shoves the thought in a corner of his head to think about later. The bills burn in his hand when he takes them to the cash register. 

* * *

  
Four days later, when the Party comes around to Scoops for some ice-cream and free way to the movies, Steve learns that Billy has been working at the swimming pool all summer. Max tells him, with careful eyes trailed on the tabletop and tremors in her fingers. 

He has a wild flash of tanned skin glistening with water, and it burns his cheeks and sticks to him, even when he shakes himself to get rid of it and Dustin stops himself long enough through his Chocolate Monster to send him a worried glance. 

He has the crazy idea of asking for his hours, it's on the tip of his tongue, but then Robin slaps him behind the head and tells him that he has work to do. And so he listens to her. 

The idea of Billy as a lifeguard doesn't leave him, not even when he scoops his tenth sugary monstrosity of the hour and not when he clocks out at 5 p.m, when the sun is still high and the air is burning. 

He tries to fight it. Really. He looks at the orange light spilling on the gigantic wall of the mall, bouncing off the hood of his car and he tries to tell himself that it's not a good idea. 

He gets in his car and drives to the pool.

* * *

The Billy that greets him isn’t his slow-motion, fresh-out-of-the-pool fantasy (that came to him unprompted and unbidden), but rather, a sulky, wrangled in a long-sleeved, seething terror. Billy glares. 

“Pool’s closed,” he says, and punctuates his sentence with a vicious splatter of water from his mop. 

The entry hall is empty save for them and his voice echoes against the tiles. Steve tries to find words; he’s not even certain why he’s here in the first place. 

“I want to talk to you,” and it’s a lie. It’s not what he wants. Not anymore. 

Billy doesn’t answer and mops away. Steve squirms, and pushes his fists in the pockets of his uniform; he would have loved the hindsight of getting changed before, if he knew how ridiculous he would feel right now. 

“Listen,” he begins, and stops, swallows back the desperation that threatens to bubble up. 

Billy levels him with a cool look; Steve licks his lips and feels his heart flicker when Billy’s eyes drop to them. 

“Listen,” he tries again, feeling more stable on his own feet. “I didn’t think it could work, okay?”

He takes a step closer, sees the way Billy tenses all over, knuckles white around the mop. Stops there, anxiety like static in his fingers. 

“But… It’s bull-” the words get caught in his throat. He swallows thickly. “It’s not true, alright? I don’t care, okay, I wanna try again.”

Billy’s face is tense lines framing the frightened light of his eyes. Steve wants to hold him; he gets closer and Billy doesn’t move, holds his mop like a barrier between them. 

“Fuck off,” he says very weakly, and his breath fan over Steve’s cheeks. It smells of strawberry gum.

Steve crowds close and the stick digs in his collarbone where Billy presses it in; his heart beats hard and fast in his throat, he’s sure Billy hears it clearly, knows how the sight of him makes Steve desperate and dry-mouthed. He hopes so, because Steve could never say it aloud. 

His eyes are so very blue, caught between fright and curiosity, like he cannot quite believe what is happening; Steve can’t either. It catches him off-guard and stops him from getting any closer; he’s suddenly horribly sure he’s about to get punched.

It explains his flinch when Billy kisses him. Steve cannot identify it as a kiss at first; it’s viciously violent, an uncomfortable clash of teeth, the sting of canines on his lower lip, the hot-white flash of adrenaline as he prepares himself for the recoil of a hit. He almost steps out of reach; but Billy gets a hand in the collar of his shirt and the mop clatters to the floor. 

Steve feels like an ocean under the merciless fury of Poseidon, molded and shaped where his hands contain him, his core a raging turmoil of lust. He grips Billy by the shoulders and tries not to topple over, brings himself closer in an attempt at steadying himself. 

Steve pushes a hand under his shirt and Billy screams. 

Steve takes a hasty step back and almost falls all over himself, hands gathered against his chest, almost in prayer; _oh God, please, what happened? Don’t make it the end of it all._

“Christ, are you okay?” he asks, and his voice wobbles. 

Billy looks red in the face, his breath short, he presses a palm where Steve touched and Steve wonders suddenly if he has somehow hands covered in acid; he looks down at them, irrationally. They look perfectly normal. 

“Shit, yeah, sorry.” Billy flushes more deeply; Steve never knew it was possibly for Billy to blush in the first place. “I’m fine.”

Steve doesn’t believe a word of it. 

“No, you’re not. What’s going on?”

Billy doesn’t talk. Steve, very carefully, steps up to him, uses his mere inch on him to tower. 

“Billy, what’s going on?”

He looks torn for a good moment, licks his lip without thinking about it; it takes everything Steve has in him to not lean down and press against the kissable shine of his mouth. He suspects that if he doesn’t get an answer from Billy right now, he won’t ever receive one. 

Instead of answering, Billy fists a hand in Steve’s shirt and lifts his own. 

Steve has a wild moment to wonder if it would look less painful in black and white, if Billy was a regular dude and not his soulmate that gifted him shades and hues. 

There is a lot of purple and yellow between Billy’s ribs and Steve would have recoiled if Billy didn’t hold onto him so tightly. 

“Shit, what the fuck happened.” It’s not a question because Steve feels the answer climbs his mind like the tide, slowly but but with inevitable certainty. 

Billy avoids his gaze, looks at the wall and lets the fabric go. Shrugs, almost as if it’s unimportant. 

“Your dad does that to you?”

He’s close enough to see the minute flinch of Billy’s fingers as he reaches for a pack of cigs in his pocket, hands very pale against the red of his shorts. He doesn’t answer; Steve doesn’t think he has to, he already knows anyway. 

He steps close again, carefully lifts the hems of Billy’s shirt; somehow, his hand finds a way to Billy’s waist, his thumb rubbing a slow circling in the warmth of his skin while Steve stares, tries to both etch it in his brain and forget it altogether. 

“You don’t have to stay there.”

Billy scoffs around his unlit cigarette. 

“And go where, pretty boy?”

Steve swallows. 

“We could leave.”

Billy snorts, softens the violence of it by pressing his hand at Steve’s nape, fingers brushing just under his collar. 

“And go where?” He repeats, and it’s very very soft between them, painfully so. 

Steve presses closer, and closer again, fits his face to the arch of Billy’s shoulder, grips his hip. He feels like he’s about to collapse or cry or die and he cannot have this happening right now. He cannot speak for a long while. 

“We could go to the Netherlands,” he croaks out finally. 

Billy laughs silently; Steve feels it in the jostle of his body. 

“Why the fuck would we do that?”

Steve lifts his head and squints at Billy; he looks unabashedly amused by Steve. His eyes are very blue. 

“Well, they have some kind of…” He racks his head for the correct words, “Union for same-sex soulmates there.”

Billy’s eyebrows flee to his hairline. 

“Like marriage?”

Steve feels himself shake and redden, heat like fire crawling up his collar and his cheeks. 

“Christ, no, not a real marriage, but a… thing. That is _not_ marriage.”

Billy looks awfully smug and Steve hides his face in his hair. Billy doesn’t say anything about messing it up; he truly feels honored at that. 

“So you want that then?”

Steve shrugs. 

“We could try, don’t you think?”

But he knows that there is no trying; that there is this life and now that he has tasted it, he cannot turn away. He knows that it’s not really a choice anymore. That there is a life with Billy or no life at all. 

He doesn’t say any of that. He buries closer and they don’t talk until the sun has set, the night warm and heavy on their shoulders, the air cool through the open windows of their cars when they leave, the light of the moon drawing patterns on their back where they lie in Steve’s room. 

* * *

There is no Netherlands, and no civil unions either. But there is a blue ocean in California and later, much later, when their joints ache from dawn till dusk and there is more white than colors in their hair, a wedding.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm very soft for old people getting married after years and years of being together. 
> 
> I feel extremely blessed by the attention this fic got, your comments and kudos warmed my heart and I'm so very glad I went through with posting it c: Thank you!
> 
> If you liked this fic, and don't know what to comment but still want to let me know, here are a few propositions:  
> \- "My favorite dragons are the ones that breathe fire."  
> \- "Gotye is now somebody that I used to know."  
> \- Your favorite season. Yeah, just a word.  
> \- "Everything is bad but at least Hozier is in good health."

**Author's Note:**

> Come chat with me on [tumblr](https://zoupia.tumblr.com/)!


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